To Lose Her
by EmilyofDreams
Summary: The moment that changed Anakin's path was the loss of his mother.  This is a short look at his emotions and actions during his last visit to Tatooine and his irreparable encounter with the Tusken Raiders as he seeks to rescue his mother.


**PART ONE**

The warm air rushed passed his face, ruffling his hair and  
fluttering his cloak behind him. His face, drawn and tight framed  
his magnetic blue eyes that were now dark, full of pain and worry.  
The light had faded, and the desert was only lit up by the three  
moons of Tatooine. They cast an eery half light across the red  
sands, that faded into the dark recesses of the jutting rocks.  
He had driven his podracer through these sands as a child. Even now  
as the urgency of the situation was upon him, he remembered being  
that child. So young. Innocent. Full of mischief.  
Anakin remembered those days with his mother…a hard life as slaves,  
but they had been happy together. The last ten years he had missed  
her very much and now…  
She's there. I can feel her. Every moment he could feel her getting  
closer and closer to him…and with that sense he could feel her  
pain. It was excruciating, to the point that he almost felt it in  
his own body. Mother, I am coming. I am coming!  
He was also getting closer and closer to the camp of the Tusken  
Raiders. Anakin sensed them too, but not with the same warm, burning  
concern. It was with an icy flare of an emotion that was agony and  
anger in one. The thought of them touching his mother made him  
absolutely livid.  
Focus, Anakin. He told himself, filling himself with the force so  
that he was devoid of anything but his purpose. I can't afford to  
be distracted. Not now. She needs me.  
Memories poured over him and he channelled his extra emotion quickly  
into his mission. Letting out a silent sigh, he stopped the  
speeder. He was very close by.  
He climbed off the speeder, leaving it hidden behind a clump of  
rocks, and mentally began to prepare himself.  
Filled with the force, Anakin climbed swiftly towards the edge of a  
cliff, moving silently and swiftly through the darkness. He stood and  
surveyed the camp below him. She was there. Heart pounding, he  
quickly and quietly dropped himself over the cliff…

**PART TWO**

Anakin stood in the shadows next to the cliff, the hood of his cloak  
drawn almost entirely over his face. He was filled with the force,  
it was held in him and yet it rushed through him heightening his  
senses to their peak. His intense blue eyes scanned the darkness in  
front of him, easily picking out the shapes of slowly moving figures  
ahead of him in the darkness, their presence beaming sharp ebbs of  
danger through the force.  
A sharp stab of pain hit him through the force, and Anakin's face  
hardened further into stoniness. Mom. I am coming Mom. She was so  
close now. He could feel her. And with her strengthened presence,  
came a sharper blast of pain that assaulted him physically. She was  
so weak. Barely hanging on.  
Mom.  
Anakin slipped away from the cliff and ran silently and quickly  
towards one of the first tents of the Tusken encampment. He paused,  
again in the deep shadows, washing himself with the force,  
focusing. If they killed her…  
He let the thought hang as he stealthily crept closer to his  
mother. He could feel her, her presence pulled through their bond  
like a magnet. There…she was there…  
His eyes settled on the tent in front of him, noticing swiftly the  
four Tuscens just outside the entrance. Anakin narrowed his eyes,  
and then a few seconds later was upon them fiercely, his lightsabre  
in his hands. He dropped to the ground as he noticed a few Tuskens  
hanging around the outside of the tent. Wiggling on his front he  
moved slowly but quietly towards the hut where the strong sense of  
his mother was. Once he reached the hut, he activated his sabre and  
began cutting a hole in the wall. Slowly he melted away the muddy  
hard wall. When finished he pushed and the wall fell inward, giving  
him space to crawl through.  
The interior was filled with candles, giving off very dim light, and  
if it wasn't for the small shaft of moonlight that was falling  
through the hole in the ceiling, he mightn't have seen her right  
away.

Agony pierced him like a wall when he saw her. She was hanging from  
the ceiling by her tied wrists, and covered in blood and bruises.  
Her eyes were closed, and though he could feel the weak pulsing of  
her life force across the room, she barely looked alive. Fear for  
her pierced him. Mom.

A few moments later he had leaped across the room and was busy  
cutting her down with his sabre. She dropped easily and he caught  
her gently in his arms. Tenderness flooded him, and tears choked upthe back of his eyes and throat as he cradled her, afraid he would  
hurt her with his touch.  
"Mom…Mom….Mom…Mom…" he whispered softly, brokenly, as her scent  
washed over him. He was a little boy again, all of a sudden. Not a  
Jedi. Not grown up. Little Ani.

Shmi's swollen eyes, caked with blood, slowly flickered open then,  
and focussed tiredly, full of exhaustion and pain on Anakin. "Ani…?"  
she breathed weakly, in amazement, "Is it you?"

Anakin choked at her words, sucking in a broken gasp as he felt her  
eyes focus on his. "I'm here, Mom. You're safe. Hang on. I'm going  
to get you out of here..." he whispered hoarsely, desperately,  
hoping to comfort her and give her hope. Pain for her flooded him,  
even as tenderness touched him as she reached out a shaking hand to  
touch his face and hair. He began to try and flow peace and comfort  
through the force to her, though he himself did not feel it.  
"Ani? Ani? You look so handsome," she told him, not seeming to hear  
his words, " My son... my  
grown-up son…" her voice came brokenly, and filled with pain, "I'm  
so proud of you, Ani... so proud... I missed you so much..." she  
paused, staring lovingly at him, "Now..." she paused, exhaustion  
evident in her voice, "I am complete…." She sighed, peace and  
contentment alighting her broken face.  
Alarm and fear slammed through him. "Just stay with me, Mom," he  
urged her, desperately, "I'm going to make you well again.  
Everything's... going to be fine." His heart caught in his throat as  
he felt a devastating shift in the force. Terrified, he stared at  
her. Her mouth began to move again slightly…  
"I love…" her words were broken off as the life went out of her. She  
slumped against him, and pain hit him full force and erupted within  
him, as he felt his bond with her completely shut off. Mom! He  
couldn't speak, he couldn't cry out as he held her close to himself,  
burying his face in her hair. A moment later he looked up, staring  
unseeingly into the air as tears burst through his eyes and a sob  
broke through him. Shoulders shaking as he sobbed silently, clinging  
to the lifeless form of his mother. Mom…don't die…please no! MOM!!!  
I love you mom! I can't do this without you!

**PART THREE**

Anakin sat rocking his mother back and forth in his arms for a long  
time, mumbling to her, until he had no more tears, and his movements  
had stilled. Her body was now cold, and yet he still sat in the  
middle of the hut, in silence, seemingly frozen in one spot. His  
grief had turned to a numb vacancy inside, as the silence sunk in,  
and the darkness sunk in. The hollow emptiness opened up into  
himself a shallow grave of pain that bubbled up threatening to  
consume him. Dark thoughts began to swirl inside his head.  
Those damn Tuscens. They are what did this to her! They killed her!  
Took her away from me! They stole her! They are evil, and terrible  
beings…His stomach churned, as he envisioned images of the torture…  
He seethed, festering the anger that had been a constant thorn in  
his side. It surged through his pain giving way to hate, the hate  
giving more and more fuel to his anger. A huge blast of the force  
was sucked through him.  
His head snapped up. Cold anger sizzled in his narrowing eyes.  
They deserve to die.  
Laying his mother carefully on the ground he leaped to his feet,  
muscles stiff and alert, eyes beginning to blaze in a cold anger  
that was burning greater with each second. He would make them pay!  
Those dirty Tuscens would feel the pain of hurting his mother…he  
would give them what they deserved a hundred fold!

The dark force surged through him, feeding off his pain and anger  
exploding through the already residual tendency, and overtaking his  
conscious thought. Darkness radiated on him, whispering all the  
things he could do to make the Tuscens understand what pain was.  
And he accepted it. He believed it. He became it. In a matter of  
seconds his twisted with agony and anger, snapped into a deadly cold  
fire, and in a flash his lightsabre was in his hands. He darted  
across the hut and thrust himself out of the hole, and into the  
early morning light, where Tuscens were slowly moving about.  
Anger flushed him, and he attacked the first group of Tusken men  
several feet away. They cried out their last breath, the killing  
fuelling Anakin's hate. The hate burst through him then giving way  
to his anger, and he was consumed.  
His lightsabre flashed. He killed them. Women, children. He burst  
into unsuspecting tents and cut them down even as they tried to  
escape. It flushed him with darkness. The darkness carried him till  
the end. Till Anakin was the only thing left alive in the camp.He stood there, surveying the dead, the force still thick with the  
aftermath of killing. It left a sickening stench that filtered  
through him, making him want to puke. But he didn't. The coldness  
still remained. His eyes still held a dangerous edge.  
Anakin snapped off his lightsabre, and began walking with long quick  
strides back to the hut. On his way he snatched two large white  
sheets off the clothesline of one of the Tusken women, and then  
quickly entered the hut where his mother's body lay.  
"Mom," he whispered, still broken, yet his voice now held a cold  
edge. "What would you think of me now?" The question fell on an eery  
silence, as his heart broke even more. I am so proud of you, Ani…  
her words came back to him in a rush. Would she be proud of him now?  
After what he'd just done? With a sinking feeling that he'd somehow  
let her down instead of revenging her, Anakin knelt down carefully  
next to her.  
NO! came the warring contradiction. They deserved what they got Mom!  
They had it coming after what they did to you! They did! I hate  
them! I hate them for what they did to you! They took you away from  
me!  
He swallowed hard, his features turning cold as he layed the white  
sheets out on a nearby roughly carved table, and then gently lifted  
up Shmi's broken, cold body and layed her on top. Slowly, Anakin  
wrapped his mother, his mind and body consumed with a violent  
upsurge of warring emotion. Grief and regret. Love and Hate.  
Shame and Anger. Defeat and Revenge.  
They boiled within him.  
They shook him.  
When Anakin was done, he lifted his mother up into his arms, and  
strode out of the hut, out of the camp, as fast as his long strides  
would take him. He didn't want to be here anymore.  
Face tense, eyes flickering watchfully over everything, he made it  
to the Lars' speeder and carefully laid his mother on the back,  
tying her there securely.  
"I love you Mom," he whispered to himself before he threw a long leg  
over the speeder and took off across the sand towards the Lars'  
homestead.


End file.
